On Sunday La Mexicana allowed as how she would also like to hike to Canyon Number Two. I told her that she was on for Monday.

What I call Cell Phone Mountain is visible from the second floor of La Mexicana's house and is the mountain one must initially climb and then descend on the other side for the trek to Canyon Number Two.

25 May 2010

It is interesting that the cacti around here bloom during the dry period before the rainy season, that is, now. The other plants do all their blooming during the rainy season as one would expect.

Fred explains this by pointing out that this strategy gives the cacti a monopoly on the services of the pollinators. The cacti do not have to share the services of the bees and other pollinators with the other plant species.

As many of you do know--and I did not, these palms develop their seeds on the lower branches in season, and the lower branches take on brilliant colors, in this case a bright yellow.

This particular specimen sits at the entrance to a small shopping center. La Mexicana has been after me for some time to take the machete and cut off some of the lower limbs so that she could use them to decorate her courtyard. I did not relish the idea of doing that. I feared that I might have to depend on her to bring me food in a Mexican jail if I were caught.

As luck would have it, somebody recently trimmed off the lower limbs. On Sunday we were able to salvage some of the downed limbs before they were all hauled off.

La Mexicana now has some of these colored limbs with which to decorate.

The big picture, then, in terms of the immediate future is this. I am still determined to become involved in some program for the benefit of children or some program for the benefit of the poor or in the best of all possible worlds, some program for the benefit of poor children.

19 May 2010

I did not say that I was going to bike all the way up Paseo del Chorro without stopping, did I? I only said that I was going to ride the bike all the way up. I am not even going to look back because I am sure that I did not say anything about stopping or not stopping on the way up.

We are at the point where I am closing in on the first anniversary of my border crossing and settlement here. Obviously, we are going to start to recycle some things. Anyway, a quick review regarding the chorro area.

That Franciscan monk who founded the city in 1542, Juan de San Miguel, originally had it set up out where San Miguel el Viejo is today. Hence, that beautiful little church that still survives there. The problem was that there is no water there. None. Which made things difficult.

Back to the bicycle for a moment. I am writing this full well knowing that those who have been riding trail bikes or mountain bikes for years will find my amazement humorous.

The Trek Under the Acacias.

This Trek 4300 is cool. I have learned that it is called a “hard tail” because there is no suspension in the back. The only suspension is in the front fork. Whatever the case, I feel as if I could ride straight up a wall with it. I know that is an illusion. Nevertheless, I am going to try riding up the Chorro hill a little later this morning, a hill so steep that it is a chore—no pun—to walk up it.

For years, having ridden only road bikes, my practice has been to keep the tires as hard as possible. If the recommended pressure was 90 to 110 pounds per square inch, I blew them up to 110 at least and sometimes more. Sometimes I just blew them up, period. The idea was to keep that line of the point of contact between the rubber and the road less than pencil thin. Because, of course, I wanted to go fast.

Now, I am in a different world. There is no way to go fast on cobblestone. And hard tires allow that cobblestone to beat the shit out of you. As a consequence, I am setting the tire pressure on the low side. The listed tire pressure on these fat Bontrager's is 40 to 65 pounds per square inch. Initially, I put them up to 65, which I soon found was a mistake. Now, I am putting them at 40, the minimum. Because, of course, I no longer care about going fast. I do not care when I get to where I am going. I do not really care if I get there at all. It is about the comfort of the ride now.

18 May 2010

We drove back to Mineral de Pozos this past Sunday to revisit the Spanish mining ruins. I suspect you may be tired of all that, but don't worry. We could not get to the ruins. Instead, we ran into the annual fair in that town. We had no idea in advance that it was going on this past weekend. You have to listen to the radio to learn these things.

A large percentage of all the Mexicans in the world had ridden buses to the outskirts of Mineral de Pozos where they disembarked and trudged into town along the main highway. It was drizzling. Very unusual for this time of year.

If you zoom in to San Miguel de Allende on the map, you will see a large body of water directly to the west of the city. This is the reservoir behind the new dam, not to be confused with the old dam out at El Charco botanical garden and nature preserve. The reservoir was my destination this morning on a bike ride with Fred.

This is what the reservoir looks like now just in advance of the rainy season. We shall see how much it fills up this year. It did not rise much at all last year.

There are many upscale homes in the area of the reservoir, Mexican McMansions.

Here is one that you might be interested in picking up. It is another of the many abandoned construction projects hereabouts.

It has clearly been abandoned for quite some time.

Fred was pondering the architectural style here, trying to come up with a name for it.

Only a two-car garage, but I think there would still be time for you to correct that.

Still, for pure drop-jaw tastelessness it does not top the place with the gutter spout in the shape of a snake that I visited last July. That project was not abandoned, and it ought to have been.

Born head first in the year 1947 during the month of March on the br>Gregorian Calendar and not dead yet. ¡Viva México!

To Contact Me

It has not been in the nature of the visitors to this blog to comment publicly on it. A visitor may wish to contact me privately to take issue with something that I have written, to offer a correction to something that I have written, or simply to send me general purpose hate mail. Visitors can contact me by email at brassawe@brassawe.com.

Many of the earlier blog entries herein where composed and posted during my five-year residency in México from 2008 to 2013. I have since taken up residence on the family farm in rural Paris, Iowa, U.S.A., which I inherited in the interim. I am now a member of the local landed gentry.